Reform UK just lost the crucial Makerfield by-election, and it lost big. In response, Nigel Farage has opted to blame the voters who chose Rupert Lowe over him:
WATCH: Nigel Farage accuses Restore Britain voters of splitting the right-wing vote in Makerfield
“What do you want… We’re the challenger party, I would urge you to think again” pic.twitter.com/4AIRo5QlzV
— Politics UK (@PolitlcsUK) June 19, 2026
Reform have blame to spare
To be entirely fair, Farage didn’t only blame voters. The problem is that blaming voters in any capacity is never a good idea. If someone already feels disinclined to vote for you, scolding them for not doing so won’t win them back.
Here’s the part in which Farage blamed voters:
But I would say this: there’s a couple of thousand voters there who would normally have gone out and voted Reform that voted Restore. And I would say directly to them: what do you want?
Is he genuinely confused about this?
They want a party which more obviously follows through on the bigoted rhetoric, Nigel; not a party which slags off the Tories and whips up prejudice against minorities only to accept Tories of colour into their ranks:
Suella Braverman has got some nerve rolling out Reform’s policy on working mums whilst the party is full of sexist racists
By @MaddisonW92 https://t.co/8uIbEEKlcz
— Canary (@TheCanaryUK) June 17, 2026
He must understand this, right? Because the only reason Reform is doing so well is because it took Tory rhetoric to a more logical end point.
For years, the Tories used immigration to fearmonger while simultaneously increasing migration. Reform came along and said ‘we’ll put a stop to that‘, which made sense to the voters who bought into the panic. Now, Restore has come along and said ‘we won’t just stop it, we’ll put it into reverse. Oh, and we’re all white guys, by the way. We know we’ve been tip toeing around the white supremacy thing for a few decades, but come on – we all know what this is about‘.
Spare a vote, mate?
In his pleading address to Restore voters, Farage continued:
We are the challenger party to the left in this country. And I would urge you to think again. I really, really would.
‘Please vote for my plucky little party‘, he’s saying. Farage is a ‘might makes right’ kind of guy; this sort of rhetoric isn’t going to win back the supremacist zealots backing Restore when Rupert Lowe is essentially calling for a race war.
Farage also congratulated the Tories on beating Reform in last night’s Scottish by-elections, before saying:
I think what we’ll see now is the Conservatives will have their pockets of strength around the country. But in the north of England, the Midlands, South Wales, many other areas, the Conservative vote now averages – in by-election after by-election – around about 2%. So Reform, still, is the big national party on the centre-right.
Sorry, Nigel, but the sort of people who are getting riled up by this far-right rhetoric aren’t going to calm down and see sense. And you don’t want them to; if they did, they wouldn’t vote for you either!
Burning hatred
This is the bed that the British right has made for itself. And don’t be surprised if there are even more hardline parties challenging Farage come the next election. Because once you decide to burn everything down, you can’t control what catches fire next.
Featured image via the Canary
By Willem Moore
From Canary via This RSS Feed.